Despite intense pressure to fill manpower gaps, Army Secretary Francis J. Harvey said the Army has no plans for any further call-up of the Individual Ready Reserve (IRR) beyond the current level of about 6,500 soldiers. The IRR is a pool of about 115,000 trained soldiers who have left active-duty or reserve units for civilian life, but remain subject to call-up for a set period.Now if they would just end stop-loss, thousands of soldiers who have basically been drafted would not have to suffer from the Army's broken promises.
Yesterday I received an email from a former roommate of mine at DLI who spent 2004 in Iraq and who is now trying to decide whether to reenlist to get the bonus or to take the chance and hope her contract is honored. She is in misery working around the clock all of the time, but she expects, as an Arabic linguist, that she will not be allowed to leave when her time is up, so she might as well take the money if she's going to be stuck in the Army.
Need more soldiers? Some advice: treat soldiers with respect, honor their contracts, fight better wars, and don't invade countries!
No comments:
Post a Comment